many recognise her as Sasha Williams on The Walking Dead, Sonequa Martin-Green will be taking on a pivotal role on the crew of the starship Discovery. Playing Lieutenant Commander Rainsford who serves as “number one”, a position first established by Majol Berett in the TOS pilot “the menagerie” and later as Captain Picard’s pet name for Commander Riker.

according to ex-showrunner Bryan Fuller, Rainsford will be the focus of Star trek Discovery. Describing her as a “lieutenant commander with caveats” he went on to tell Entertainment Weekly:

We’ve seen six series from the captain’s point of view… To see a character from a [new] perspective on the starship — one who has different dynamic relationships with a captain, with subordinates, it gave us richer context.

At first it may seem a bit disconcerting to have a star trek that won’t focus on the captain, however, keep in mind that previous star trek incarnations have ultimately been ensamble shows so this could be an opportunity for a unique perspective.

There has never been a star trek series without klingons. this will be no different as three Klingons have also been announced!

the status of forehead makeup is at this time unknown

From the highly anticipated “American Gods” adaptation Chris Obi will portray T’Kuvma and Shazad Latif (Dr Jekyll on Penny Dreadful) will play his protege Commander Kol, the two are apparently trying to unite the Klingon houses (to find out how successful they will be check out he TNG episodes “Sins of the Father” and “Reunion”). Joining them is shakespearean actress Mary Chieffo as Battle Deck Commander L’Rell, at an imposing 6 ft Chieffo will no doubt channel a bit of Klingon antagonists Lursa and B’Etor into her performance.

Woah! Lots of new ska on this episode! Heck, some of these songs JUST came out! (I mean, except that Kill Lincoln track, that one’s about 5 yrs old) The one comment I get from people when they find out I do a ska podcast, or that I’m into ska in general, is “ska is still a thing?” As much as I want to lecture them on the long history of ska I just say “Yep!” And when listening to bands such as these put out music so recently that is so good, well, ska is going to be a thing for quite awhile! We’ve got a handful of artists from the US, a few from the UK and heck, we even have one from Bulgaria! Dig that international ska, baby!

I’m a huge Stephen King nerd. To anyone that knows me this is not a surprise. In the sub-set of this I am a big Dark Tower fan as well. Reading through his books and finding the connections was a giant thrill. Even before getting into the Dark Tower set of books knowing that in Needful Things we revisit the farm from Cujo made me excited. Reading and seeing that the monster that Tad is afraid lives in his closet in Cujo is Frank Dodd from The Dead Zone blew my mind.

While today shared universes are abundant in films and even some in books back when these books were coming out it wasn’t nearly as common. So getting a reference to another book you had read was like a new experience.

Later I got into the Dark Tower books and found out that everything King has written is connected to this one set of stories. Every character and every plot can be traced back to the Tower through any amount of small to large references.

When it was announced that at Comicon that they were actually printing up versions of the childrens book Charlie The Choo-Choo as exclusive items I tried to get anyone I knew that was there to grab me one. Sadly it was not meant to be. Luckily Simon and Schuster saw there was a demand for this so they decided to make it a mass market book.

I was lucky enough to get sent a review copy and I was jumping up and down with glee when it came in the mail. It serves as a basic meta prop from the Dark Tower book. Jake finds a copy of Charlie The Choo-Choo in a book store in the Tower books and now there is a real version you can hold in your hands.

With the movie coming up it’s a fun item to have. I read through it and it is presented with great artwork from Ned Dameron as it tells the tale of old Charlie as he is seen as obsolete next to the more modern diesel engine, who looks like I imagine Blaine The Mono looks from The Wastelands. It’s a fun thing to own if you’re a big King fan like I am. I have it sitting on my shelf with the Dark Tower books.

I was lucky enough to be on the Talk Without Rhythm podcast to talk about 2 Michael Mann films Thief and Collateral. Stop in and take a listen.

This week on the Talk Without RhythmPodcast I’m joined by my buddy Bryan of The Last Horrorcast and Geek Nerdery for a truly Mannly double-feature of Michael Mann movies. We’re discussing how the best laid plans of professionals and psychopaths so often go awry with 1981’s Thief and 2004’s Collateral.

Season 2 comes to a close with the return of several characters we thought were dead, and the death of characters that were also already dead.

The thing I loved about the original series of movies was the continuous ramping up of the absurdity. The over-the-top violence and gore and comedy from Army of Darkness had its humble beginnings as a straight-up, serious horror movie in Evil Dead. Evil Dead 2 split the difference, offering straight horror with some absurdly bad-ass moments and lots of comedy.

The TV series seems to be continuing the same path. All season, we’ve seen the blood and gore continue to ramp up, as well as the gross factor. In this episode, we got a little too close to Henrietta. As a horror movie nerd, not a lot makes me recoil in disgust, but this scene did it for me. Bravo to the writer who asked themselves the question, “what if Henrietta breast-fed Ash?”

The finale certainly skated the line between nostalgia and wondering if the writers had gone through their entire bag of tricks. It’s a delicate balance to strike, but since we saw a fight between Ash and Henrietta nearly 30 years ago, do we need to redo the fight exactly? The answer, of course, is yes. As long as you can balance out the references to the original with a new take on it.

Ash and crew return to a hero’s welcome with a parade and cheerleaders. Just as Season 1 ended in victory, so did Season 2. But Ruby’s reappearance in the crowd means maybe we shouldn’t get too comfortable yet. Will Season 3 Ruby be friend or foe? We’ve got a long wait to see.

Overall, Season 2 is better than Season 1, and gives me even more hope for the seasons to come.

And if you watched the episode and didn’t hang on tight for the post-credit scene, I recommend you do that.

In going through the history of WildStorm, I sometimes come across books like this. One shots that I had no idea existed, and I was probably better for it! So there’s this book, “Voodoo / Zealot : Skin Trade.” This sad little book, this effing book. Ok, let’s be serious for a minute, this book is basically a bunch of pin-ups arranged as a story. But trashier than that sounds. For all the cheesecake glory that is “Gen13” when compared to this book “Gen13” ends up looking rather tame. And, if I was a better reviewer, and thought this was the place to get into it, I’d comment on how WildStorm went from putting out a book like this, where the women are all posed as sexual objects first and to serve the story second, to eventually putting out books that dealt with a more mature take on sex and sexuality in such a small span of time. Not to mention how much ahead of the curve on that kind of thing they were in regards to DC and Marvel. But this isn’t the blog for that and I’d never do that argument justice anyway!

We catch up with Zealot training Priss in the ways of the Coda. Along for the “It’s Not the Danger Room!” session is Cole and Jeremy who both admonish Zealot for being too harsh with Priss. Little Big Jake tells Zealot that she needs to lay off of Priss a bit and she needs a break. Zealot storms off and is then confronted by Providence. Providence tells Zealot she has information about her Zealot’s previously unknown child and proceeds to give some long convoluted story of how it’s been cryogenically frozen and will still be a young kid. Also, it’s in Yurgovia and she should go save it. Most of this is a lie, but Providence needs to get Zealot to Yurgovia and Zealot will meet her kid, so she embellished a lot.

So why does Providence need to get Zealot to Yurgovia? Well, ok, remember Yurgovia from the “WildC.A.T.s Special”? Remember how there was this Coda gal named Destine that was running it? Remember how she died getting shot in the back by Cole? Welp, I guess it didn’t take because she’s back and she’s pissed. She’s out to take Yurgovia back from the people that’d been running it since she’d been assumed dead, and also to grow her own little branch of the Coda as well. She has a few recruits already and she’s looking for more to train, which means kidnapping the children of Yurgovia. In the end, it seems that Providence didn’t like all this, because who would, and vowed to put and end to Destine’s schemes. Oh, and Destine has a bit of “the Orb” that created her and Void and she means to have it back. Not that Providence went about it attaining her goals in any logical manner, she handed out half truths to Zealot and double crossed Destine.

I like coloring. It’s relaxing to just sort of sit and grab the colored pencils for a little while. And if you’re like me then you like things of more of the creepy persuasion.

Well I was excited to get this Creepy Christmas Coloring Book in the mail. Flipping throught it I could see it was right up my alley. Awesome pictures just waiting for me to color of Krampus, reindeer, and all sorts of Christmas themed horror. The atwork of Mister Sam Shearon is just great. Each image represents the folklore of different regions around the world and is even accompanied by a poem with each one. Dive into the folklore history of Christmas and help get into the spirit.

Of course what I picked was Santa Claws. This is the type of Santa I would have wanted to send after my brother when he was annoying me when I was little.

if you have someone in your life who would appreciate this stocking stuffer in your life you can grab one over at CreepyChristmasColoringBook.Com. Get them ready for the horror of next Christmas and learn about monsters and folklore from all over the world.

Over the years ESPN: 30 For 30 and E:60 series has released some fantastic documentaries and when it comes to wrestling ESPN isn’t afraid to cover such a great sport. First example would be The Wrestler, spotlighting Scott Hall (Razor Ramon) and his rise and fall in professional wrestling. Another example would be Behind the Curtain, looking at WWE’s developmental territory NXT and a handful of then up in coming talent trying to make it to the main roster.

With that said, February 2, 2017 ESPN will be releasing another 30 For 30 special but this time it’s for Vince McMahon’s football company XFL. The XFL only lasted one season back in 2001. Look for This Was The XFL coming in 2017.

Ever since it was announced I was super excited about this game. Why has it taken this long? The idea of a multiplayer game where one player is Jason and you hunt down, kill, and dismember camp counselors controlled by other players seems like a no brainer.

Add in that you can select specific skins to pick your favorite Jason, different weapons to make the kills variable, and mo-capped by Kane Hodder himself and this becomes a must buy.

Today they broke the news that a new playable character may in fact give Jason a run for his money. Tommy Jarvis from parts 4-6 has come to Camp Crystal Lake. This Tommy is based on the version from part 6 when Thom Mathews played him. He sports the classic denim jacket and bad attitude.

I can’t wait to jump into the game on either side to stalk/run through Camp Crystal Lake and see what Easter Eggs await. The website http://f13game.com/ allows you preorder the game now. It looks like the multiplayer version will hit early 2017 with a singler player version coming out later in 2017. Are you picking this up?

I’m a fan of Wes Anderson. Sometimes his schtick works. Sometimes it doesn’t. But I think he’s got a decent track record. my favorite films of his are still Rushmore and Life Aquatic. It’s fun to see him stretch out into other media such as commercials when it happens. He did an American Express commercial a few years ago and now he’s back with his easy to spot visual style in the new H&M Christmas commercial. He enlists frequent Anderson actor Adrian Brody to bring the holiday cheer. Below is the full length trailer. Shorter versions have been running on TV nation wide. Enjoy.

Ever since it was announced that Marvel and Sony had struck a deal to bring Spider-Man into the Marvel Cinematic Universe people wondered what would his fist solo movie entail. Well we’ve been waiting since Civil War premiered. Now we’re here. Some fun shots of The Vulture in costume and a pretty creepy line from Michael Keaton delivered in perfect bad guy mode. Can’t wait to see it this July. What about you?

Hey everyone one! It’s your second favorite ska geek, what’s up? I’ve just finished the first of a three-night Slackers concert. I’m tired as heck, but man, still so excited for tonight and tomorrow! That’s what we do for our nerdery right? Go hard? Three shows, two of them on work nights? Let’s suit up and do this! Not sure how I’m supposed to make it through work on tomorrow, and my wife already has plans to let me sleep in in Saturday, because she knows that 3 days of work and ska is going to wipe me the heck out. Sorry, I don’t usually like to brag, but I’m super excited about these shows!

Everything old is new again, and thank what ever god you hold dear for that! Like many of you, I grew up on a steady diet of The Disney Afternoon (my internet handle is DarkwingMantis after all) and one of the finest pieces of original Disney television animation is making a comeback!

Disney has been talking about a revival of the fan favorite Duck Tales in 2017 for a year or two and now we finally have rock solid confirmation in the form of a teaser.

Duck Tales centered around billionaire Scrooge McDuck and his clan having adventures, seeking out treasure and fighting an eclectic assortment of bad guys who all wanted a piece of his money bin.

Not much is known about the new revival or how many of the original cast will be returning. Alan Young, the original voice of Scrooge McDuck sadly passed away in may this year after returning to the franchise, reprising his role for the Duck Tales game remaster.

I personally am hoping that if this is a hit we could see a revival of some of the other Disney Afternoon franchises (Darkwing Duck especially)!

Join us as we discuss a couple of cheesy 80s slashers featuring pranks gone wrong, Terror Train [spoilers from 41:22-52:11] and Slaughter High. Warning: if you were a nerd in school who was promised sex by the popular kids and they instead pulled a prank at your expense, don’t listen. We don’t want to give you any ideas.

I”m a HUGE fan of Scream Factory and what they do. Today they announced upcoming Collector Editions of Robocop 2 and 3. Now you can set these next to your Criterion Collection of the first one. So get your jet pack ready and pre-order now!

From Scream Factory:

Fans of the popular Robocop sci-fi franchise and are for a treat next year as we’re bringing both ROBOCOP 2 & ROBOCOP 3 into the Scream Factory family on March 21st!

– Both Blu-ray releases will be branded as “Collector’s Editions” that will come with a slipcover (guaranteed for three months after its original release date).

– The newly-commissioned front-facing artwork you see pictured on both comes to us from artist Paul Shipper (Escape from New York, The Thing) The reverse side of the wraps will showcase the original theatrical poster art designs.

– Bonus features and specs are still in progress and will be announced sometime in Feb.

James Gunn posted on Facebook that the trailer for Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol. 2 has become the biggest trailer debut for Marvel Studios yet.

I have watched the trailer at least ten times since it debuted online on Saturday. Guardians was a surprise hit for me as I knew nothing about the team other than they had been in a Marvel coming at some point in history. So when I went in with no expectations I was not expecting to leave the theater with a new favorite movie in my top 5 of all time.

I told a friend once that I felt like I did the first time I watched Star Wars as a kid. He was surprised but for me I just knew this was something special and I was hoping that it being connected to this bigger Marvel Cinematic Universe would not eventually drag the franchise down and making it fall in line with all the others. Don’t get me wrong I am a big MCU fanboy but this feels like something different. Something special. I just didn’t want that shiny wearing off when you have guidelines to fulfill when it has to fall in line with the other films.

Well this trailer looks like Gunn and company are still going full steam ahead on doing their own fun filled space adventure. I can’t wait to check it out next summer. Have you checked it out yet?

For those just joining us, I decided to map out a chronology of the history of the WildStorm Universe. A “beloved” part of the Image Comics group in the early ’90s. This week I’m covering four issues of their flagship title “WildC.A.T.s” which featured the eternal war between two alien races, the Kherubim, and the Daemonites. Not that these issues advance any of that story at all.

I’m not going to mince words when these issues came out, I was really torn. I didn’t like them that much, but I really loved the new heroes it introduced. Well, not Huntsman so much, but Savant, Mr. Majestic, and Soldier! But that was back in the day when I didn’t have that much comic reading under my belt, and scarcely knew the name Chris Claremont. Now that I’ve grown up, and read all those classic X-Men back issues and I’m more on board with this run than I was as a kid. Hell, thanks to “Jay & Miles X-Plain the X-Men” I can’t help but hear some of Wu’s narration in their “Angry Claremontian Narrator” voice. I’m a more nuanced comic reader now that I’ve learned some more history… some 20 odd years later, and I actually kind of enjoy it. Mind you, not as much as I did later issues of “WildC.A.T.s” but I didn’t dislike this as much as I did in my youth.

The first issue in the arc kicks off with Zealot trying to combat train Priss down by the waterfront near New York. Now, I have no idea if this kind of area even exists in New York City, but it does in the WSU, so we’re going have to accept it. Priss isn’t high on becoming a Coda warrior and Zealot seems chill not to take it that far (well, chill as a clef blade to the neck) when suddenly a ship explodes into the sky featuring a wounded man named Alabaster Wu. Mr. Wu’s being pursued by a beast known as a Raksha. Zealot makes short work of the Raksha, decapitating it in front of Priss, as she goes to investigate the ship while Wu takes the hell off. Turns out, Wu knows Jacob, and he needs his help! But getting to Marlowe is easier than it sounds, as he’s being chased by Priss. Oh yeah, that cut up Raksha, it totally infected Priss, taking over her mind and body, giving her a mad on to hunt down Wu.

Zealot is working her way through the ship, and she comes upon a small and passed out girl. She vows to protect this child from the beasts and starts kicking some Raksha booty. Eventually, the girl’s protector, the Huntsman, shows up and they declare a truce after a bit of back and forth between them. During the battle, Zealot took some damage from a Raksha, and a Raksha has blood that’ll eff you up, it’s a “turn you into a literal Raksha” eff you up kind of problem, so Huntsman wants to help get Zealot someplace where they can get her some help. I mean, a good idea would be to go meet back up with the rest of the WildC.A.T.s, right?

Well, the rest of the team is busy. See, Wu got a hold of Jacob and Jacob goes to meet Wu alone. While this is happening, Raksha possessed Priss convinces the team that Wu is trouble and that they need to go save Jacob from him. So Void teleports the team to where Wu and Jacob are and they’re suddenly under attack from the Troika (Attica, H.A.R.M., and Slag) who are joined by Void Jr. AKA Providence. It’s all a set up by the true villains of the story, Tapestry and Lord Soma. They hired the Troika, who I guess brought Providence along for the hell of it, and are quite pleased with to see a Raksha take over one of their enemies already, Priss.

Who is Tapestry? She’s some kind of witch that can undo your life’s events and rewrite them. Not sure if she’s overwriting these events in reality, or just in one’s brain. Either way, in the end, it’ll bend your personality to whatever Tapestry wants. Lord Soma? Oh, he hangs out with Tapestry. That’s about it. We’re not even sure if he’s a Kherubim or Daemonite high lord, like everyone else who has the title “Lord” in WildStorm books. Maybe Lord is just his first name, and his parents didn’t spell it “Lorde” because he’s a precious little snowflake with his gray skin, facial tattoos and on point mustache and soul patch game.

I’m an old-school horror nerd, and am especially obsessed with Evil Dead. I’ve loved Evil Dead for over 20 years, so imagine my surprise when I recently heard, for the very first time, that Evil Dead may be a ripoff of a movie called Equinox. With an open mind, I decided to watch this movie and decide for myself.

There are some definite similarities in imagery and plot. Those similarities cannot be overlooked. Remember how in Evil Dead, the evil was represented by a traveling camera? Well, maybe that wasn’t quite as original as we’d all thought.

Thematically, both movies involve an ancient book that is read from that unleashes evil.

So maybe those things could just be coincidence, right? I mean, how original an idea is unleashing evil from a book anyway?

Oh, but there’s also flying demons that are very similar to the one in Evil Dead 2. There’s a professor who has the book and a group who stumbles upon it accidentally. There’s a necklace that is important to the plot and their salvation. There’s imagery involving clocks and reel-to-reel audio recorders. There’s even an ancient castle similar to the one that makes an appearance in Evil Dead 2.

Outside of some basic themes and imagery, there’s other similarities. Just like Evil Dead, Equinox was produced on a shoestring budget by near-amateurs with ambitious ideas. There is also an element of possession by evil, which leads the friends to lower their defenses and try to help their friends who have turned on them.

There are many differences, too. While Evil Dead is primarily demons and possession, Equinox is more monsters and the devil. Generally speaking, Equinox thinks ‘bigger’, with portals to other dimensions, evil beasts and the devil. Evil Dead keeps it simple with an unseen even force and friends turning on each other.

It’s hard to look at this movie I’ve loved forever and imagine that maybe, just maybe, it’s not as original as I’d thought it was. Overall though, I don’t care much about originality in horror movies. Zombies and slashers are my favorite sub-genres, and both of those sub-genres include very little originality. The most important part to remember is that, if Evil Dead truly did rip off Equinox, they did it in a way that improved the original. It’s lasted longer, has withstood the test of time better, and I still enjoy it even if they did take some cues from this other movie.

In short, even if it is a rip-off, who fucking cares? Evil Dead for life.

Just when I think I couldn’t love Ash vs. Evil Dead anymore, it turns out I was wrong. There’s always more love for me to give to the series.

I love the buddy/traveling aspect of the show, don’t get me wrong. But there’s nothing better than returning to the cabin and Ash going it alone for a while. So far each season has had a return to the cabin, and I hope this trend continues until the series ends. The cabin is where the story started, and it’s where the story should end.

Throwbacks galore in this episode. Enough for even those filthy casual fans to catch. They perfectly recreated the “Little Ash” scene from Army of Darkness with a new spin on it.

The cabin is so perfectly recreated, and we get another Evil Dead alumni reprising their role. This time it’s Ted Raimi as Henrietta.

One of my favorite aspects of this series is the perfect balance it carries between expanding the mythology but also revisiting old themes and throwbacks. This episode featured a lot of throwbacks, but also traveled back to the past to introduce us to Dr. Knowby, who previously we’d only seen in a few tiny flashbacks.

Next week is the Season 2 finale, so we’ll find out if this time traveling saves Pablo or undoes this evil. Will we see the old crew return to the cabin? Will Pablo come back? I, for one, can’t wait to find out.